Objectives  With the continuous improvement of submarines' stealth property and combat capabilities, the underwater challenges faced by surface ships are increasingly becoming serious. To enhance the capabilities of overall scenario awareness, sustained surveillance and early warning of submarines, this paper systematically studies the long-range target detection method using underwater explosive sound sources as the emission source.

  Methods  Based on the principle of bistatic sonar localization, the solution equation of underwater targets is given. According to the energy relationship, the mathematical model of the maximum detectable range of the system is deduced. The spatial distribution of the target localization error is analyzed by numerical simulation, the target detection range and localization accuracy of explosive sound sources with different deploying distances are examined.

  Results  The results show that the detection of underwater target based on explosive sound sources cannot expand the detection range in the whole plane, but it can obtain greater detection advantages in a certain angle range near the baseline extension line. On this basis, by reasonably allocating multiple explosive sound sources, the warning distance of the submarine can be increased.

  Conclusions   Effective target information can be provided for aircraft-based on-called antisubmarine operation.